I am a very big fan of Terry Pratchett and his Discworld series of books, and having worked in the past as a library technician, one of the places I love best on the Disc is the Library of the Unseen University.
For anyone who has not read the Discworld books and doesn't know about the library or the librarian
a quote from one of the books describes it
"The layout of the Library of Unseen University was a topographical nightmare, the sheer presence of so much stored magic twisting dimensions and gravity into the kind of spaghetti that would make M.C.Escher go for a good lie down, or possibly sideways."
To achieve the impression of neverending rows of books, I've used lots of mirrors in my library to reflect back on themselves creating the illusion of corridors stretching on and on, a very hard subject to photograph.
The room box is 20" deep and 14" wide (I should translate that into cms. but I grew up pre-decimal and still think in inches)
I think now that I may one day recover this with paper clay bricks ....one day.....
At the front of the library is the return desk, and heaven help the student who fails to return his books on time!
From there the corridors stretch on, a careful student wizard will tell his friends to come and look for him if he's not back from the Library in time for dinner. Sometimes even the Librarian uses a ball of thread to mark his own trail.
Like the famous Bodleian Library at Oxford, Unseen University also features chained books – although at Oxford this is done to protect the books from the students, whereas at UU it is done to protect the students from the books.
This has been a long term project as I added books and more books - I showed this room first at the Sydney Miniatures Show in 2005 and again in 2006.
Since then I have been working on a lower level for it, which will probably be the stacks for the library (groan, more books!) or perhaps the Alchemists Guild will move into a couple of the rooms.
Please check back here as I'll create static links to the Library posts as I add them
